The overall year-on-year inflation rate as measured by the Consumer Price Index (CPI) was 6.6 per cent, in December 2023.
This was mainly driven by increases in prices of commodities under Transport (11.7%); Housing, Water, Electricity, Gas and other fuels (8.3%); and Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages (7.7%) between December 2022 and December 2023.
These three divisions account for over 57 per cent of the weights of the 13 broad categories.
The CPI and inflation are generated from data collected through monthly surveys of retail prices that target a representative basket of household consumption goods and services.
The data collection is conducted in the second and third weeks of the month from a sample of outlets located in 50 data collection zones across the country.
As presented in Table 1 and Table 2, the CPI increased by 0.4 per cent from an index of 137.03 in November 2023 to 137.55 in December 2023.
Further, as shown in Table 2, the Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages Index rose by 0.3 per cent between November 2023 and December 2023.
This was lower than the increase of 0.4 per cent observed between October 2023 and November 2023.
As presented in Table 3, prices of carrots, kale “Sukuma-wiki”, mutton/goat meat and beef with bones increased by 14.5, 6.2. 5.1 and 3.6 per cent, respectively between November 2023 and December 2023.
Commodities whose prices dropped in December 2023
During the same period, however, prices of mangoes, potatoes, maize flour-sifted and fortified maize flour went down by 5.7, 4.9, 3.8 and 3.7 per cent, respectively.
The Housing, Water, Electricity, Gas and Other Fuels Index increased by 0.4 per cent between November 2023 and December 2023 mainly due to increases in prices of 200 kWh and 50 kWh of electricity by 1.0 per cent and 1.2 per cent, respectively.
In addition, the price of a litre of Kerosene dropped by 2.0 per cent during the same period.
But despite a drop in the prices of petrol and diesel by 2.3 per cent and 1.0 per cent, respectively, between November 2023 and December 2023, the Transport Index went up by 0.5 per cent during the period, mainly due to an increase in country bus fares for some routes.
